The Tax Administration received nearly 10,864 anonymous tip-offs about businesses or individuals last year, after opening an online service designed to make it easier to report possible tax fraud. The reports related to around 9,500 individuals or businesses, as some were the subject of more than one report.
The most reports were made in Helsinki, with 1,810 tip-offs, followed by Tampere (451), Espoo (421) and Turku (406).
In a statement released on Monday, the tax office said that fears over malicious complaints have largely proven to be unfounded.
"We can’t say in how many cases the tip-off was a substantive factor," Heimo Säkkinen of the Tax Office was quoted as saying. "Tax fraud tip-offs are not in any case ever the only reason to begin a tax investigation."
In all 1,213 people or businesses, about which the administration received a tip-off, were considered as targets for an investigation. In addition 426 targets were identified for scrutiny over provision of receipts.